


Leverage Long Live

by jesterladyvids



Category: Leverage
Genre: Embedded Video, Epilepsy Warning, Fanvids, Gen, Team Dynamics, Team Feels, Team as Family, Video, Video Format: Streaming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-05
Updated: 2020-08-05
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:26:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 0
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25732816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jesterladyvids/pseuds/jesterladyvids
Summary: Tribute to Leverage
Relationships: Team Leverage & Team Leverage
Kudos: 12





	Leverage Long Live

**Author's Note:**

> So I've done it. I'm posting the vid that I have spent years wanting to make and fearing to make, believing I couldn't do it justice. This is my opus, guys. It's a Leverage vid to the perfect song. My technical skills can 100% be better, but no vid was ever agonized over more, made with such love and planning, and I kind of tear up when I watch it myself so...there you go.  
> Coloring by glamourstar0x
> 
> The second I heard the song Long Live, I just knew that it was a Leverage song.  
> The two lines that immediately stood out to me were:  
> -A band of thieves in ripped up jeans got to rule the world  
> -Bring on all the pretenders
> 
> Little pictures of how this vid could be hovered in my mind for years. But this was too big, too important to waste on my incompetent vidding skills. I waited and I kept making vids and I probably would have waited forever since I still don't feel skilled enough to make what I really want to make. But then they announced the new Leverage and so I knew that I couldn't wait anymore because my Leverage would soon be changed forever.
> 
> I planned this vid more than I have ever planned anything, dreaming about it at night and scripting each shot. I still didn't get everything in that I wanted. There was so much stuff I had to leave out and that makes me sad. There are some things I had such big dreams for, see re: above band of thieves line, and it's not quite what I had wanted. And do you know how many times these people interact with kids? You might think I got all of them in there, but I did not and that makes me sad. But I am so proud of this thing, y'all. So so proud.

**Author's Note:**

> You might guess I don't have super high hopes for the new Leverage. I'm always anxious that creators are going to kill the things I love and it's happened too many times. (Rob Thomas, I'm looking at you!!!!) And for me, Leverage is perfect. Like literally perfect. I wouldn't change any of it. And I've never been able to say that about anything before. It has the perfect characters, the perfect relationships, the perfect plots, the perfect music, writing, acting, cinematography, the perfect completely resolved story, the perfect found family. I would not change anything! And you'd think that I could trust the people who made such perfection to continue making it, but I don't. Too much time has gone by, there are too many changes already. So even though I really don't think I can watch the new one, just the knowledge of it out there existing, taints, if you will, my Leverage.
> 
> And you know what, it's not gonna be Leverage without Nate. He is my least favorite character by default alone and I have been so saddened by the complete lack of people missing this amazing character and how there are these joke posts going around Tumblr about how they want to treat him being missing by either acting like he never existed when people ask or constantly insisting Noah Wyle was him all along. And I don't think you guys understand just how important Nate was to the show. In a way, that honestly affected the story of my vid. Without Nate there would be no Leverage and nobody knows that more than the other Leverage crew. 
> 
> Now here's the thing, we left the show with Nate and Sophie leaving. Honestly, that's cool. It's a fitting end. Now I firmly believe that they are entrenched in Leverage forever and share secrets every Christmas and help out on jobs when their kids call them for help, but if you were going to reboot the show, Leverage 3.0 was the way to do it, with Nate and Sophie guest starring. I could have handled that and it would have made sense.
> 
> I love Gina Bellman and Sophie, guys, I do. But it in no way makes sense for her to be there without Nate and still keep the growth and success of the original story.  
> There's only so many ways that I can think of for them to handle the Nate absence and literally none of them make me happy or make sense to me.  
> 1\. Nate never existed. Unacceptable, the entire previous 5 seasons falls apart.  
> 2\. Nate is replaced by another actor (ie Noah Wyle). Unacceptable, we've gone through too much with Timothy Hutton and you mess with the delicate ecosystem of actor chemistry. Plus, I love Noah guys, he's amazing. But he can't be Nate. He just can't do it.  
> 3\. Nate is dead. UNACCEPTABLE! Killing people that integral is rude to the 9th degree, but doing it off screen is so heinous, I hate to think them capable of it. It's insulting to your story and your fans.  
> 4\. Nate is kidnapped/in trouble etc, and that's what they're there to do as an over-arching plot. Makes sense because Sophie is there without him, they can engage the help of Noah Wyle in the meantime, but it's still problematic. A, that's not Leverage's style. Even the Damien Moreau arc was not that deep rooted and sunk in to the season. B, that implies that Timothy Hutton could come back, and I don't think they're going to do that as much as I wish it would happen.  
> 5\. Nate is always just off screen, you catch glimpses of his back, people calling him on the phone or yelling to him in the next room. Constant references to him, etc. This is the option I like best because it does have that tongue in cheek aspect the people on Tumblr want as well as still giving Nate the importance he deserves and inspires hope for Timothy Hutton to come back. But again, I think that would be a miracle.
> 
> So you see why I am not hopeful and why it depresses me that they're continuing my favorite show. Isn't that sad. I also don't think people realize the impact of having Aldis Hodge there only part time will be. Now, I've seen them do it. On Librarians, Flynn was only there half the time and it made sense the way they did it, BUT every episode when he was there was better. The rest always lacked something. So it does affect the quality of the show. AND this is Hardison we're talking about, glue of the show, heart of the show, the one 'who takes care of all the prep for the con' part of the show. His absence will also be bad. And I worry about how that affects his relationship with Parker. Because Pretzels holds a huge piece of my heart and they made it so beautifully and I don't want it to be wrecked by the passage of time or new ideas or his absence. 
> 
> It just doesn't make sense to mess with perfection. Sometimes you don't eat the rest of the cake to save yourself from getting sick.


End file.
